They won't change/renew the plan without the phone, unless they use your current as a "placeholder" and convert it to a multi-line account. At which point you've altered your contract and lose unlimited data.

They won't change/renew the plan without the phone, unless they use your current as a "placeholder" and convert it to a multi-line account. At which point you've altered your contract and lose unlimited data.

The GS3 has become a familiar sight here in the Middle East--in fact the ever elusive 'pebble blue' is no longer so. I played with a friend's unit yesterday at work. I must say, it was super smooth even with my detested TouchWiz (at least on my GTab 7.7). Compared to my AT&T One X, that I use here, which in itself is a hella fast device, it was noticeably slicker. And all that 'nature-inspired' design crap which I thought was pure marketing BS? I am a believer.

The best thing? The notification light is hidden under the cover and shows up only when needed (unlike on my G-Nex). The S3 is a hell of a device and I can see it taking Samsung to the top. A job well done. It'll be my next device when I get bored of my One X in a couple of months.

All I'm seeing at Sasktel's website is blue and white shells...no black? Do they just assume everyone covers it up with a skin?

Yep, there's no pure black. Probably a mix of wanting to be a bit daring, plus making it tougher for Apple to claim that it's a copy (let's face it, every non-US Galaxy S/S II variant was pretty blatant about the me-too attitude).

Do look in person before you criticize, though. You may just like it as-is!

All I'm seeing at Sasktel's website is blue and white shells...no black? Do they just assume everyone covers it up with a skin?

Yep, there's no pure black. Probably a mix of wanting to be a bit daring, plus making it tougher for Apple to claim that it's a copy (let's face it, every non-US Galaxy S/S II variant was pretty blatant about the me-too attitude).

Do look in person before you criticize, though. You may just like it as-is!

Nope, they don't have them in stock yet around here. Knee jerk reaction is that white is a no-go and the blue looks odd, but I'll check them out first before ordering something to cover it up with Contract is up on my original Galaxy S in October...really looking forward to the upgrade.

Someone who got an early hands-on here on Ars mentioned that the blue is more like a deep blue and not a very bright blue, so if you're looking for something understated the blue is probably your best bet. Either that or wait for a flat black skin to come out.

Someone who got an early hands-on here on Ars mentioned that the blue is more like a deep blue and not a very bright blue, so if you're looking for something understated the blue is probably your best bet. Either that or wait for a flat black skin to come out.

There are really only two things I look for in a case, and that Rock case only has one of them.

(i) Protection for the bottom & top of the phone. If you ever store the phone in a pocket with e.g. coins (or anything else), it's the bottom that gets dinged up.(ii) Even a small lip on the front, so that if the phone is ever placed screen-down on anything, it's held even a millimetre or two off whatever the surface is.

Some gel bumpers would be nice too. A friend of mine had a GS2 for about a week, accidentally dropped it, and the durable, tough Gorilla Glass screen promptly shattered. I presume it hit on one of its corners, and all the shock was focused there. A gel bumper might've prevented it.

Yeah, something like that or similar would be fine. I have my Galaxy S1 in a hinged black-anodised metal case by PDAir, and while the case is pretty shiny in a couple of places, the phone itself is in near-mint condition. Seems the gorilla glass can stand up to scratches very well, but impacts, less so.

Purely anecdotal of course, but I've had my S2X since launch and have dropped it more than a few times without any damage. Most of these involved me hitting it across the counter tops and onto the wood floor, but a few have been in the garage onto concrete. It can be a bit slippery in the hand, and I was hoping the S3 would deal with this with a different back.

I had the oddest thing happen, and kind of scary. I configured the phone to sync with my corporate email, the same way I have done on all my Android phones, my Windows phone, my iPhone, and iPad.

I start texting a friend and realize that all my texts and synching with my corporate email. I can see all my sent and received text messages appearing on the email server on my laptop. So, I stop texting... I then uninstalled the corporate email account and went onto my corporate email client through Outlook webmail and deleted the phone as a device.

I have no idea what happened, how it happened, or why. But it scared the hell out of me.

Was this an error with the remote security application that you have to accept when you add a corporate email account to the phone?

Similar sort of design to an Otterbox, I think - soft silicone inner sleeve, with a snap-on hard plastic back. It feels fairly rugged all in, although it's a bit of a pain to fit together. The silicone sleeve has large rubber pads over the volume rocker & power buttons, and since it all fits very tightly together, it can be extremely hard to fit the pads through the cutouts on the plastic back-piece if you put the silicone on the phone first. You basically need to fit the silicone inside the backpiece first, then just jam the phone inside it all. Once it's in place, however, it fits tightly enough to make you think it's a natural part of the phone rather than a seperate case.

Seems fairly rugged, though. There's a small lip on the front to prevent the screen sitting directly on flat surfaces, and deeper cutouts for the camera, flash & speaker on the back. The silicone should also give it a little bounce when I inevitably drop it, too.

I like it a lot. I also have a Nexus S (running CyanogenMod) and an Asus Transformer (also rooted and running a 3rd party ROM).

We will see what happens with updates, but I like this phone a lot. Just about everything works great out of the box, except some of the oddball Samsung apps which seem like they need some setup. (And I'll probably never set them up.) e.x . S Voice seems near useless.. it misunderstands just about everything I say.

Otherwise we will see how the updates go. I am not inclined to root/rom this phone. While there are a handful of things I don't like about Nature UX (e.x. how it handles folders in it's launcher), there are a bunch of things I actually like better then stock android and/or CM9. There are some things that really seem like useability improvements.

The screen is great, the thing is blindingly fast, and so far battery life has been very good... I like it a lot. It did seem OMG huge the first day.. but it disappears in your pocket since it's so thin. And if I go back to my Nexus S the 4" screen seems really small now. The GS3 is GREAT for using the Kindle App, etc.. to read on in a pinch.

edit: BTW.. I got the overpriced flip cover back case.. it is nice except for one thing.. it interferes with using the rear-facing camera, although it is not a deal breaker.

I was hoping the Incredible 4G would come out before then (especially since it was announced/leaked/whatever back in April or May), but it didn't. Hence, buy SGS3 and then debate either keeping it or selling it to buy the Incredible 4 became the only options.

I stopped by the Verizon store to play with the Incredible 4, and unfortunately tethered to the security theft thing means it's hard to get a real evaluation on weight and heft, but I get the feeling I may go ahead and switch.

I was hoping the Incredible 4G would come out before then (especially since it was announced/leaked/whatever back in April or May), but it didn't. Hence, buy SGS3 and then debate either keeping it or selling it to buy the Incredible 4 became the only options.

I stopped by the Verizon store to play with the Incredible 4, and unfortunately tethered to the security theft thing means it's hard to get a real evaluation on weight and heft, but I get the feeling I may go ahead and switch.

We were in the exact same camp then....I just got my SGS3 last night, upgrading from an Inc for the unlimited data as well.

Originally when I got my Inc, I thought the likes of the Mot Razr and other 4" screens was too large, but I'm actually really digging the really large screen.It's primarily helped by the fact the SGS3 is soooo damn thin. It's like I took my Inc and squished it flat for more screen real estate. The really think the thin bezil on the sides also helps quite a bit.Comparing it to a friend's SGS2, the size difference is negligible so I'm even more so pleasantly surprised. I was pretty worried I'd find it too big.

I haven't played with the Inc 4G but I'm quite happy with the SGS3 as a whole.I liked the power charging on the side better than the bottom, and there's some UI differences between HTC Sense and Samsung but nothing I wouldn't get used to.

I was hoping the Incredible 4G would come out before then (especially since it was announced/leaked/whatever back in April or May), but it didn't. Hence, buy SGS3 and then debate either keeping it or selling it to buy the Incredible 4 became the only options.

I stopped by the Verizon store to play with the Incredible 4, and unfortunately tethered to the security theft thing means it's hard to get a real evaluation on weight and heft, but I get the feeling I may go ahead and switch.

We should all start a club of "rape victims of verizon" or something. We can have tea on Thursdays.

I'm thinking of returning my phone (got it yesterday) and opting to buy an unlocked phone for $600. The fact that they would even offer such a thing means Verizon's whole "our network will suffer with unlocked bootloaders" argument is, as always, full of shit.

And yes, this phone is big. Like, dildo big. Its awkward to hold while I drive, eat, and pluck my eyebrows.

Is there a reason you'd want to return the one you got instead of selling it? Seems like the only advantage would be not being locked in to a Verizon contract, but if you were planning on leaving Verizon, you could get an unlocked one from any other provider.

And yes, this phone is big. Like, dildo big. Its awkward to hold while I drive, eat, and pluck my eyebrows.

However, it's not Galaxy Note big. I went from a Galaxy S-1 to the SIII, and it's not uncomfortably bulky, and still fits easily in a front pocket of my denims. And it's still extremely thin and light, even inside a case.

But if you bought the phone for 200 and sell it for 500, then you make 300, which should be more than the termination fee, right? I'm not sure what Verizon charges, but usually the termination fee is less than the discount on a top end smartphone.

Agreed. I'm debating. As I said I played with the Incredible 4 yesterday and it's about the same weight as the SGS3. The SGS3's massive width/height is still not attractive (doesn't fit nearly as comfortably in the hand), but the weight is very good as is the 2GB memory and the 1280x720 screen.

If it wasn't for the locked bootloader, well, that's my last dealbreaking reservation. And checking XDA-Developers or whatever forum it is, it looks like the next OTA software update will break the current trick being used to load custom ROMs on the SGS3. So that battle might be a pain in the *ss too...

I may hold off for the Anandtech review on the Incredible 4, hopefully that'll be up in a few days. Per Engadget or whoever it was (so many reviews!) the Incredible 4 looks good, but so does the SGS3...

- The Samsung keyboard is one of the worst android keyboards I've ever seen. (Horrible autocorrection behavior, etc..) I can't believe how good SwiftKey is though. And that this is my 4th android device and I waited all this time to try it.

- The Samsung keyboard is one of the worst android keyboards I've ever seen. (Horrible autocorrection behavior, etc..) I can't believe how good SwiftKey is though. And that this is my 4th android device and I waited all this time to try it.

I prefer FLexT9. It's really really good IMO. It was free on Amazaon free app of the day a while back.

Quote:

- The Smart Alarm thing is pretty cool.

What's this? I'm still digging through all the new fancy and cool features, especially coming from HTC Sense.

What's this? I'm still digging through all the new fancy and cool features, especially coming from HTC Sense.

I tend to use my phone as an alarm clock.. the smart alarm is just a different set of ring tones that are setup to start playing very softly and slowly ramp up over a long configurable period of time.

So instead of a blaring ring tone it mimics a more natural wakeup.. the tones are stuff like music + birds singing, rain falling, etc..

It'd be cooler if you could set it to play music of your choice, but it's still much nicer then the stock android alarm clock.

(I tend to think there are certain things these phones should have out of the box... e.x. everything capability my Palm whatever had out of the box in 1999 should be on and android device that you buy in 2012. (Notes, alarm clock, calendar, world clock, timer, stopwatch, to-do list, etc.. ) Sounds like a joke but stock android is still missing some of this stuff!

BTW.. I am on AT&T.. if you get pushed an update today, it is the update that removes the ability for the google search widget to search items local to the phone like the Nexus devices recently got.

I guess it'a possibly that it varies per carrier, but for the TMobile SGH-T9999, the default KB is most definitely (an older version of)FlexT9, called "Samsung Keyboard". FlexT9 and Swype are extremely similar, they were both made by the same company, and are now owned by Nuance. Why they have two of pretty much the same thing is unknowable, but these are the same people to stupid to sell their product in the market.